MV Glenachulish, the Last Manually-Operated Turntable Ferry

Posted on by May 3, 2023

I am sorry to say that we missed seeing this intriguing ferry, MV Glenachulish, when we visited Skye last September. (We went “over the sea to Skye” on the more conventional ferry from Mallaig to Armadale.) I had never heard of a turntable ferry before Dick Kooyman was kind enough to pass this short video from the BBC of the world’s last manually-operated turntable ferry. 

Its unique design allows it to navigate the challenging tidal conditions of the Kylerhea Narrows between the Scottish mainland and the Isle of Skye.  The 550-meter (600-yard) crossing takes five minutes and is the shortest sea crossing to Skye. The ferry runs seven days a week between Easter and October.

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Investigation : Channel Distress Calls Ignored 19 Times Before 2021 Disaster

Posted on by May 1, 2023

A recent investigation reveals that at least 440 people in distress appear to have been abandoned in the weeks before the worst Channel disaster in 30 years.

On November 23, 2021, at around 10PM an inflatable boat with over 30 people aboard, mostly Kurds from Iraq or Iran, tried to cross the Channel from France to the UK. Around midnight the boat began to deflate and sink in the middle of the Channel. The Guardian reports that when the passengers repeatedly made calls to French and UK emergency services, the French told them they were in British waters while the British told them they were in French waters. 

Of those on board the overcrowded boat, 31 are believed to have drowned. Twenty-seven bodies were recovered. Four are still missing. Only two people survived the incident, the worst maritime disaster in the Channel for 30 years. Among the dead were 21 men, seven women, including one who was pregnant, and three adolescents.

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Harry Belafonte and the Port Chicago Disaster & Mutiny

Posted on by April 30, 2023

Harry Belafonte, the multi-talented  American singer, actor, and activist, died last week at the age of 96. Born in Harlem to Jamaican immigrants, he shattered racial boundaries in the 1950s. During his career, Belafonte popularized calypso music with audiences around the world. He also won an Emmy, three Grammys, an Oscar, and a Tony, earning the distinction of being an EGOT winner. His 1956 album Calypso was the first million-selling LP by a single artist. In addition to his accomplishments as a performer, Belafonte was a lifelong activist for civil rights and a supporter of humanitarian causes.

Belafonte also served in the Navy during World War II, dropping out of high school to enlist in 1944. During WWII, the military remained segregated and African Americans were not generally allowed in combat roles. He was assigned to work loading munitions ships in Port Chicago, California, and narrowly missed one of the deadliest stateside explosions of the war.

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Kirsten Neuschäfer Wins 2022 Golden Globe — First Woman to Win a Solo Round the World Race

Posted on by April 28, 2023

Congratulations to Kirsten Neuschäfer, winner of the 2022 Golden Globe Race. After 235 days at sea, the 39-year-old South African sailor crossed the finish line off Les Sables d’Olonne in France at 9pm CEST on Thursday, becoming the first woman to win a solo, round-the-world yacht race.

The race is based on the 1968-69 Sunday Times Golden Globe Race which saw Sir Robin Knox-Johnston become the first person to circumnavigate the globe, sailing solo on his boat Suhaili without stopping.

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Navy Nominates Rear Adm. Yvette Davids to be First Woman to Lead Naval Academy

Posted on by April 27, 2023

The Navy has nominated Rear Adm. Yvette Davids to become the first female superintendent of the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland. Unfortunately, her confirmation is being delayed, as are the promotions of over 180 fellow senior military officers, by Senator Tommy Tuberville (R, Alabama), who is blocking promotions as part of his protest against the Pentagon’s new abortion policy. 

Military.com notes that Davids, who became a naval officer in 1989, has commanded the frigate USS Curts, the cruiser USS Bunker Hill, and she was the commander of Carrier Strike Group 11. Her assignment to Curts made her the first Hispanic American woman to command a Navy warship. She was also one of the first Hispanic American women to command a carrier strike group.

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Update: “Unprecedented” Sea Level Rise Defies North Carolina Legislation

Posted on by April 25, 2023

Just over a decade ago, we posted about how legislators in North Carolina passed a law that banned the state from basing coastal policies on the latest scientific predictions of how much the sea level will rise. The law required government planning boards to only use predictions of sea level rise based on linear projections from 1900.  The increased rise in sea-level due to climate change would not only be ignored but would be illegal for land use planning.

At the time, we compared their obdurate denial of climate change to Xerxes the Great ordering the sea to be flogged with chains when a storm destroyed a bridge across the Hellespont in 480 BCE,

It now looks like we were right. North Carolina’s law has proven no more effective in addressing sea level rise than Xerxes’ thalassian flogging. The Star News Online reports that new research shows that the sea level along the North Carolina coast is rising faster than in most other parts of the United States, and faster than what most scientists had expected.

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Destroyer USS Paul Hamilton Makes $42 Million Drug Bust in Gulf of Oman

Posted on by April 24, 2023

The guided-missile destroyer USS Paul Hamilton recently intercepted a fishing boat in the Gulf of Oman carrying 802 kilograms of methamphetamines and 1,000 kilograms of hashish. Before being boarded, the five crewmembers on the fishing vessel – who identified themselves as Iranian nationals – attempted to throw at least 50 35-pound bags of amphetamines overboard, some of which were ultimately recovered by the Navy. The cargo was valued at $42 million dollars.

“This was outstanding work by the entire Paul Hamilton team,” Capt. Anthony Webber, commander of Task Force 55, responsible for overseeing U.S. maritime surface operations in the Middle East, said in a Navy release. “These interdictions remove illicit narcotics from the high seas and help deter destabilizing activity in regional waters.”

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A Glimpse Inside First Narco-Sub Seized in Europe

Posted on by April 23, 2023

In late 2019, we posted about Spanish authorities seizing a narco sub loaded with 3 tonnes of cocaine, valued at $110 million, off the northwestern coast of Galicia. Narco subs have been caught operating in the Pacific and in the Gulf of Mexico for several years. The vessel seized by Spain is believed to be the first narco sub apprehended after crossing the Atlantic Ocean from South America to Europe.

Last month, another sub was discovered off the Spanish coast – again in the Galicia region.

In the video below Nick Beake, reporting for the BBC, provides a glimpse inside the first narco sub seized off Spain, which is now a trophy in the car park of the Spanish police academy in Ávila.

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Wreck of SS Montevideo Maru, Australia’s Worst Maritime Disaster, Found After 81 Years

Posted on by April 22, 2023

On July 1, 1942, the submarine USS Sturgeon was on its fifth war patrol in the South China Sea off the northwest coast of the Philippines’ Luzon Island, when it sighted a Japanese troop transport, SS Montevideo Maru.  The submarine fired four torpedoes just before dawn, causing the vessel to sink in only 11 minutes. Unbeknownst to those aboard the Sturgeon, the Montevideo Maru was carrying approximately 1,060 prisoners from around 16 countries, including more than 850 Australian service members. 

An estimated 1,054 prisoners (178 non-commissioned officers, 667 soldiers, and 209 civilians) died when the ship sank. The sinking is considered the worst maritime disaster in Australia’s history.

Australia’s Defence Minister Richard Marles said on Saturday that the wreck of a Japanese merchant ship, sunk in World War Two with 864 Australian soldiers on board, had been found in the South China Sea, ending a tragic chapter of the country’s history.

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Wreckage of Historic Submarine Defender Found in Long Island Sound

Posted on by April 20, 2023

Connecticut divers have discovered the wreckage of an experimental submarine built in 1907 and later scuttled in Long Island Sound.

The Defender was found Sunday by a team led by Richard Simon, a commercial diver from Coventry, Connecticut. The submarine was discovered at a depth of over 150 feet (45 meters) off the coast of Old Saybrook, CT.

The 92-foot-long submarine, originally named Lake, was designed and owned by Simon Lake to compete for a US Navy contract. Lake lost that competition and then tried refitting the submarine for minesweeping, salvage, and rescue work, renaming it the Defender. But he never found a buyer. It was a well-known sub and was even visited by aviator Amelia Earhart in 1929.

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Eleven Indonesian Fisherman, Stranded by Cyclone Ilsa, Rescued After Six Days Without Food

Posted on by April 19, 2023

Photo: Australian Maritime Safety Authority

The BBC reports that eleven Indonesian fishermen have been rescued after surviving for six days without food or water on a tiny island off Australia’s coast.

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority said they were airlifted to safety on Monday from Bedwell Island, some 330km (205 miles) west of the town of Broome in Western Australia.

But nine others are feared dead.

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USS Cleveland, Last Freedom Class LCS, Douses Tugboat in Dramatic Side Launch

Posted on by April 18, 2023

The side-launching of the Litoral Combat Ship (LCS) USS Cleveland last Saturday in the Fincantieri Marinette Marine shipyard in Marinette, Wisconsin was at the very least dramatic. When the ship slid sideways into the water it narrowly missed striking a tug assisting in the launch. The wave created by the launching broke over the tug giving it a thorough dousing. From the video below, it does not appear that the two vessels actually collided.

The launching was also notable as the last side launch expected to be performed in the shipyard. According to the US Department of Defense (DOD), any future ships are “planned to be launched using a shiplift system.”

USS Cleveland is also the 16th and last of the problem-plagued Freedom Class LCS variant to be built.

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Jeanne Socrates Prepares to Set Sail Again, Solo Across the Pacific, at 80

Posted on by April 15, 2023

Jeanne Socrates was 76 in October 2018, when she set sail alone from Victoria, British Columbia, on her 38′ yacht Nereida. She returned to Victoria 339 days later, then 77, having sailed singlehanded non-stop around world, becoming the oldest sailor to do so.

Now, at 80, Socrates, currently in Mexico, is setting off again to sail solo across the Pacific. This will be a very different voyage, however, from her previous epic circumnavigations. Practical Boat Owner reports that unlike her last record-breaking voyage, this time Jeanne Socrates intends to cruise Nereida, stopping at islands along the way.

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Historic Schooner Victory Chimes to be Sold at Auction

Posted on by April 13, 2023

The three-masted schooner Victory Chimes, based in Rockland, Maine, will soon be sold at public auction. The 128-foot schooner will be auctioned through online bidding that begins at 9 a.m. on April 23 and continues until 1 p.m. on May 8, according to Keenan Auction Company of Portland. 

The schooner has been a fixture of the Maine windjammer fleet for almost 70 years.  Built in Bethel, Delaware in 1900, for the first 45 years of her career, she carried general cargo in the Chesapeake Bay until she was converted for the passenger trade in 1946 and moved to Maine in 1954.

The Victory Chimes is the last surviving Chesapeake Ram schooner. She is a US National Historic Landmark and is represented on the Maine State Quarter, originally minted in 2003. 

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Dramatic South Atlantic Rescue of Golden Globe Race Sailor Ian Herbert Jones

Posted on by April 12, 2023

Ian Herbert Jones of Great Britain, competing in the 2022-23 Golden Globe Race, was successfully rescued after his Tradewind 35 Puffin had rolled over and dismasted, with the skipper injuring his back and incurring a gash to his head. Jones was northeast of Cape Horn when he became overwhelmed in winds gusting over 90 knots and a confused sea. 

Scuttlebutt Sailing News reports that it was 1740 UTC when Jones first saw the Taiwanese Fishing Vessel ZI DA WANG arriving from the North. Twenty-six hours earlier, he was unable to make contact by sat phone and set off his EPIRB to make sure the Search and Rescue chain of his zone – NAVAREA 6 – knew where he was, and that he was facing a bad situation.

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